Dartmouth kicked off into the sun and slight wind but immediately were called to defend their territory with Uplyme’s Anthony Simes putting in an early shot. Dartmouth however soon came back and worried the Uplyme defence for several minutes before Uplyme again went forward with Sam Jones, Jack Heath and Simes all pressing the Dartmouth defence. However in the fifteenth minute a break forward by Dartmouth brought out the Uplyme keeper, Brett James who, whilst bravely diving on the ball received a knock on the head which took him out of most of the game. He was replaced in goal by James Dunford (in his debut match). After a further quarter of an hour of balanced play it was Dartmouth who, after a couple of minutes of intense attack, scored. Although Uplyme retaliated and again went forward it was Dartmouth who scored again in the thirty fifth minute. Just before half time Simes for Uplyme, from twenty yards out, lobbed the ball over the Dartmouth goalkeeper to put the score somewhere nearer a fair reflection of the game played. The score at half time was 2 – 1 to Dartmouth AFC.

The second half saw a fired up display from Jones, Uplyme’s captain, who after thirteen seconds evened up the score. After this initial flurry the game settled to an evenly balanced struggle. Uplyme’s keeper and backs defended hard with notably Matt Pile and Callum Taylor putting their heads to good use. Yet, in the tenth minute, it was Dartmouth who smuggled the ball into the net from a very busy goalmouth to retake the lead. After a relatively quiet period the Uplyme attack again fired themselves up and were rewarded with an equaliser – Jones again from a good cross from Pile. Five minutes later Uplyme got ahead, again thanks to a spirited run and shot by Jones from a pass from Pile. Ten minutes later, from a corner, Dartmouth evened up the score taking the score to 4 all after 80 minutes.

In the first period of extra time both teams attacked hard but both defences equalled their effort and no goals resulted. In the second period of extra time Uplyme’s forwards, assisted by James (their keeper earlier taken off due to injury), rekindled their fire - after two minutes Pile screamed down the left to score and five minutes later Jones put away his fourth goal to give Uplyme a two goal advantage at the end of the game.

Uplyme’s Man of the Match was judged to be Sam Jones. Their next match is home to Chard Town on Sunday 22nd November at 2.30 pm._________________Tim Fox
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Uplyme
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